Oscar Nayakane!!!

"Ella Pugazhum Iraivanukke" ,"Mere paas Ma hai", "Ohm" the sweetest word , "jai Ho India" , Where did you expect these words to be used .... On a stage in Chennai... or Mumbai maybe.... hmmm the whole world saw these words resonated on a world's famous and most acepted stage where Indians were recognized, a film based on India's soul was recognized, a humble musical genius was recognized. A.R Rahman made us all proud,  as did the film "SlumDog Millionaire" and Resul Pukutty. But this oscar belongs to only one person, who won two awards on the same stage. Its our own Rahman who made India proud. When he uttered few words in tamil, I almost teared up. A person from my local and my language made me proud.
This victory of Rahman is sweet for all of us Indians,for one big reason, He didnt win this award for his composition for "Lord of rings 3" english stage drama, not for his "Warriors of heaven and earth" a chinese film... but for a Indian music, a music which he made westerners to stand up and stun. The film music had lots of my national language Hindi elements and still accepted , thats the strength and power of Rahman music's reach.
In all, its a night we have been waiting for and Rahman didnt disappoint his fans. A golden Globe, a Bafta and now "2" Oscars.....You rock and we love and salute you sir.................

Music Review-Yavarum Nalam

After a year’s gap, maddy’s new Tamil film Yavarum Nalam is getting released next month.It’s a high budget promising suspense thriller. Being an ardent fan of his, I was waiting for the music release and today I heard all the songs(Shankar Ehasaan loy).Not once but twice , so that I am eligible to give a review. Before even starting to listen, the list of songs was bizarre for me.5 original scores and 4 more remixes of the same 4 out of 5 songs. I could not understand the logic of including two versions of the same songs. Maybe the music directors Shankar, Ehson and Loy (Shanky’s grp), each came up with a score and ultimately the director liked two of the three versions and wanted it in the CD.My weird guess ;-P . Now here’s my review of Yavaram Nalam Tamil Songs . ‘Yavarum Nalam’ sung by Shankar Mahadevan , the title song is a soothing number but could have added more energy.May serve as a BGM when the title and names of artists rolls up at the start of the film. The remix version adds little pace but still below par.’Chinnakkuyil Koovam’ sung by Kartik is reminiscent of old songs, lacking freshness.The remix version also fails to make an impact.Kaatrilae Vaasame sung by Shankar Mahadevan & Chitra is again a 90’s number.The singers’ voice is of course sweet but the music isn’t.The remix version is no different. ‘Oh Sexy Mama’ by Jazzie Gift, Anuradha Sriram & Loy Mendonsa tries a new genre compared to the others in the film, a kind of rap.In the remix version, the ending of the song is very interesting with some good sweet beats. The Theme (Instrumental) is a classical drama thriller BGM, nothing more than that. All in all ,I don’t know if the music will help the cause of a thriller movie, but it is sure not to create any ripples in its audio sales. I would give an average rating, thumbs-down for all the disappointing compositions from Shanky’s group.

Know to say "No"

I happened to read a good article by speaker Rinus le Roux on how to say no and avoid saying yes always. And I just thought of sharing that article with you. Hope it is of some help in your corporate life where each act of yours carries significance and has repercussions.

Here's how to just say 'no'
The inability to say "no" has been blamed on Calvinism, the strict middle-class upbringing that most of us were exposed to, the fear of rejection, etc.Whatever the reason, one thing is certain, this inability has become a disability … all over the globe.It is not a difficult word to learn or understand, but it is definitely loaded with emotional connotations. It is especially bad when a request comes from a superior person or from someone that we love. It is almost as if one goes into the victim mode immediately, saying "yes" when everything in your being is screaming "no"!

There are many reasons why we struggle with this powerful two-letter word. Here are two of the most important ones:
•  Vague boundaries: If your personal boundaries are not clearly defined, it is easier for someone else to twist your arm. The clearer your boundaries, the more difficult it will be for others, or even yourself, to overstep them. Despite the fact that emotions come into play, set your boundaries in a conscious way and trust yourself to uphold them.
•  Deep insecurities: This is the most difficult issue to tackle because it has to do with your self-governance system, which includes your deepest beliefs and values. If you believe you are an unworthy person, operating from a low self esteem, you will really struggle to say "no". You will feel that by agreeing to do what is asked of you, your self-worth and self-value will increase. Ironically, the opposite is actually true. If you constantly give in without taking a definitive stand you are undermining and reducing your self-worth. Dealing with this issue will take you on a journey towards the self and it will trigger a process of empowerment through new beliefs and ventures.

If the struggle to just say "no" to all the requests and demands knocking at your door becomes too difficult, consider the following:
•  If you don't learn to say "no", burnout will definitely be a visitor at your door.
•  You have the right to say "no".
•  Only a fool juggles more balls than he or she can handle.
•  To protect yourself you need to live within boundaries - and you set them.
•  Respect yourself before you respect anyone else.
•  Your self-worth is worth more than being rejected.

We often feel we must always be available to whatever it is we are committed to. Commitment is not a 24/7 availability business. Remember, we teach people how to treat us. The responsibility lies within us to set the boundaries.
When we say "yes", it should be because we want to.
Setting boundaries by saying "no" makes saying "yes" just so much more meaningful.

See you all in my next blog and hope I have been of some service to you today!!

Do we need a return to Swadeshi Economics?

I have always been a strong supporter of Globalization , as my formative years were spent in seeing P.V Narasasimha Rao and FM at that time ,Manmohan Singh's policies for new India. Their policies got us rich dividends and India opened up to the world market. This was also a time when we started identifying ourselves with the US more than with Russia as a global partner. And over the period of 15 to 20 years we have marched progressively. We started to embrace the US mode of economic policies believing in its success.

Now we started seeing the dollar crisis for over an year now and its worsening day by day in US.Closure of major banks, filing of bankruptcy by leading companies, crashing stock exchange and a poor GDP. This according to the economists should not be seen as a global slowdown , rather its an american economic crisis which they inflicted upon the whole world. And How should the countries like India react? Their answer is very simple. There is not need to panic. India is a "Saving ecoomy". "Family" being a strong institution in India and since they do not rely upon stocks rather rely on safe mode of deposits, Indian micro-level (family level) economics is strong and so at the macro level (country level) also its stronger. And it calls for more interest in what is called a Swadeshi mode of economics.That is to increase consumption of products in India itself reducing the country's dependence upon exports. This will protect and insulate India from any global slowdowns. And according to IMF growth rate of India is going to be the highest in the world next year second only to China. Even in China "Family" as a entity is very strong unlike US. So there is more providence and less dependence on the Govt ( to request bail out in emergency)

Acc. to leading economist M.R Venakatesh, the Swadeshi idea is all about balancing past excessive dependence on external demand, urban-based mass manufacturing, and unproductive asset-building on one hand; with structural development in domestic demand, traditional sectors (e.g., agriculture, SMEs, and rural households) and entrepreneurs, and improvement in the pricing power of Swadeshi goods and services on the other. So we can understand that, India should move along in its path of Globalization with caution and rely more on its domestic consumption of products and services, rather than believing that export can only drive economy.Infact export-led growth has reinforced the dependency of developing countries on the developed world, thus becoming vulnerable to slowdowns in the latter's markets . Infact we need to promote development by relying on the expansion of domestic demand, take the expansion of domestic demand, especially consumption, as a major driving force, and transform economic growth from being driven by investment and export to being driven by consumption, investment, domestic and foreign demand combined in a balanced manner.
Thank you all. See you in my next post.
Sivasundar